Lee's Search for Christmas Spirit
by The Carnivorous Muffin
Summary: It's December 25th and Eru Lee is spending the day delivering presents to all of her favorite acquaintances and friends. However, she finds herself distracted by thoughts of the Shinigami and her own uncertain relationship to him. side fic of "Minato Namikaze and the Destroyer of Worlds"
**Author's Note: The usual warnings that this is a side fic to "Minato Namikaze and the Destroyer of Worlds" and if you haven't read a fair bit of that you'll be confused and that also this is NOT CANON. Because there's no way in hell I'm introducing toddler Kakashi in a side fic, and other reasons.**

* * *

It was Christmas in Konoha, which meant to any reasonable person that it was the 25th of December. A day that was usually accompanied by the biting cold that came with deep winter and the knowledge that while any reasonable civilian would spend it inside shinobi didn't have that luxury.

But that was to Minato, to Lee, the 25th of December had a strange and inexplicable significance. Inexplicable, not because it didn't have any explanation, but because Lee seemed incapable of explaining it.

It had something to do with the birth of the sage of the sixth paths, a large man in red who flew around the world to deliver presents, tiny elves who lived in sweatshops in the north pole and made toys, and that great mysterious thing called the true spirit of Christmas.

What this usually meant was that Lee would spend the month of December running around in a red hat, stringing thousands of lights on every tree in Konoha along with balls made of glass and golden stars, hanging up over decorated socks above the mantle place, and watching morally uplifting television specials about the importance of family and friendship.

Then, on the 25th of December, she'd teleport around Konoha delivering presents to everyone she knew (and coal to those she felt had been morally reprehensible and were undeserving of gifts).

It had been fine when they were five, he actually enjoyed it then, because she'd always get him something really nice and then they'd spend the day together inside huddled by the fireplace eating cookies. It reminded him that Lee really was the closest thing he had to family.

But Lee hadn't really known anyone back then, or at least, no one she considered worth giving presents to besides Minato. That list had slowly expanded as they'd gone through the academy and now had almost tripled in length, to the point where she'd have to spend most of the day getting through clan compound security rather than spending it with Minato.

He didn't know why he'd expected anything different, now that they were genin, maybe because like a reasonable Christmas ignorant person Jiraiya had wanted to meet them for training and had been expecting Lee to make an appearance. Either way though, it was December 25th, he, Haru, and Jiraiya were all at the training grounds, shivering against the cold, and Lee was nowhere in sight.

"Hey, Minato-kun, where's your partner in crime?" Jiraiya asked, looking fairly concerned, which was fair considering that Lee was either being almost killed by Orochimaru or had been placed into a holding cell again.

"It's Christmas," Minato explained with a sigh before adding, "It means she has twenty-four to deliver gifts to everyone she considers vaguely important in Konoha… It's a Lee thing."

"Do I even want to know?" Jiraiya asked, looking to Haru for reassurance, but Haru just shrugged never having been involved in this particular Lee tradition back in the academy.

"You'll probably find out anyway." Minato said, as he was pretty sure Jiraiya and even Haru had been added to the list. Minato had already received his gift, before Lee had started out for the day, but as far as he could tell no one else had yet.

At that moment as if to emphasize this point, there was a loud crack, and Lee in her striped green and red uniform with the red hat on top of her head and the brown sack of presents thrown over her shoulder, "Merry Christmas, team seven! God bless us, everyone! Except for the plant zombies, those can burn in hell."

With a cheerful grin she dug out of her bag and handed a large box wrapped in the gaudiest paper anyone could imagine. She handed it in all its ribboned splendor to the somewhat stunned Jiraiya, "Merry Christmas, Jiraiya sensei! You've been really good this year, putting up with Minato and my shenanigans, saving us from certain death by plant zombies, teaching us how to kill people, so I thought you deserved a gift!"

"…You're welcome?" Jiraiya asked, looking at the box with trepidation, and with great care and caution opening it to reveal a box filled with video tapes.

"I got you interdimensional porn!"

Jiraiya's eyes widened and he looked at Lee with a horrified expression, "Wait, what, you got me what?"

"I made each of Shakespeare's greatest plays into a porn film with the help of underpaid women in the red light district and this one guy from ANBU who is so disillusioned with life that he'll do just about anything for money." She pointed to one of the tapes, "You should watch Hamlet, it's really steamy."

"I feel like everything I've ever loved has betrayed me." Jiraiya said, looking at the tapes both with longing and horror, which was fair considering that Minato didn't even want to think of Jiraiya watching anything like that.

It was bad enough that he camped out of the women's changing rooms, now he was going to watch porn written and developed by Lee, he honestly didn't know which was worse.

"But remember, sensei, the true gift of Christmas is love." Lee whispered, and then rummaged through her bag again, she pulled out another box, just as over decorated as the last and with an overly cheerful grin handed it to Haru.

"Dead Last, despite being essentially dead weight, the worst on our team, and the first to be picked off in any combat oriented situation, you're actually fairly tolerable."

"…Thanks, Lee… It means a lot." Haru said, his eyebrows lowered and a look of tried patience on his face. He sighed and looked at the box, glanced over at Jiraiya who looked like he was near tears (whether out of joy or overwhelming agony was anyone's guess), "You got me… A book."

Haru pulled out a journal, the kind you could buy in the nearest supermarket, with the title, "How Not to be Completely Useless and Get Eaten by Zombies" written in Lee's spidery handwriting.

"Not just any book, Dead Last, I decided that I should pass on all my wisdom to you in the form of a self-help book so that you can teach yourself how to be less awful at everything." Lee was suddenly at Haru's side, flipping through the contents, "There's a chapter on ninjutsu, on taijutsu, on weapons, on how to prepare yourself for the inevitable collapse of the universe…"

"…Thanks, I'll read it very closely." Haru settled on, looking less and less thrilled as Lee went on.

"You should, Dead Last, you really should." Lee advised, patting him on the back.

He wanted to ask when she thought she'd be done, when he could expect her to come back, but at the last minute held his tongue. After all, it wasn't a bad thing that Lee now knew so many people. She'd never had an issue with Minato's friends, so he shouldn't have an issue with hers, she'd come back when she came back and then they could do something fun together.

Still, it would have been nice if she'd stick around for training. But, he knew without asking, that she wouldn't.

With all of the presents delivered to her teammates Lee closed her sack and threw it over her shoulder once again, offered them all a final salute, and said, "And remember kids, the true spirit of Christmas comes from within!"

"Wait a minute, Lee-chan, we still have team…" Jiraiya started, but it was too late and Lee was already gone.

The wind howled, bitter and cold, saying more than any of them could ever hope to about the situation.

Minato looked at Jiraiya, then at Haru, and reassured, "She'll be back to normal tomorrow."

* * *

"Merry Christmas, Orochcimaru!"

Orochimaru looked up from his vials to see the bane of his existence, practically sparkling with childish delight, standing on top of his dissection table dressed in the most ridiculous and unpractical clothing he'd ever seen.

He reached for a scalpel with his empty hand, and threw it towards her unguarded face, watching as it fell uselessly against her chakra shield. Lee, meanwhile, didn't flinch, she in fact didn't even blink.

Anyone with any self-preservation was at least wary of Orochimaru, most children were absolutely terrified of him, but Eru Lee…

There was a small irrational part of him that felt that Eru Lee only existed in this world to torment him.

"As Konoha's mad scientist, whose human experimentation will probably one day destroy us all, and whose killed enough of my clones that I'm actually kind of concerned for my physical safety around you, I decided to put you on the naughty list." With a cheerful grin she placed a lump of coal into his empty hand, closing her own over his, "Try to make some friends next year, it might go a little better for you then."

Then with a final smile she shouted, "Merry Christmas, Orochimaru-sama, and good luck with the zombie army!"

And then she disappeared from whence she came, leaving Orochimaru with a vial in one hand, coal in the other, and a pounding headache.

* * *

"Merry Christmas, retired hokages plus Mito and Kushina!"

Out of thin air, Eru Lee teleported into Uzumaki Mito's garden, right under the wooden blade Tobirama had been using for katas, ducking out of the way before he hit her in the head.

He had to find a way to stop her from doing that, there had to be some sort of a seal, or if there wasn't then he needed some reassurance that Eru Lee couldn't simply appear in his house whenever she liked dressed like… some sort of a fashion impaired demon.

(Good god, there were times he wondered if she wasn't related to Hashirama, because surely that overly cheerful attitude, ridiculous amounts of power, and that terrible sense in fashion couldn't occur twice without reason.)

"Is that Lee?" Kushina asked, darting her head out from inside the house, to get a look at her former classmate.

"Oh, it's little Lee-chan!" Hashirama said, wandering over from where he had been inspecting his plants and enjoying the freezing cold, "What are you doing here today?"

"Hashirama, as the first hokage you're pretty much guaranteed a spot on the nice list so even though we haven't talked much this year I was more than certain you deserved a present."

She fished into the oversized brown sack she'd had over her shoulder and brought out a colorfully wrapped box.

There were stars in Hashirama's eyes as he accepted it, his face practically glowing with happiness, "Is this, is this for me?"

Without further ado he shredded the wrapping apart, throwing the colorful bits of paper all over the yard without care, and opened the box to reveal a small evergreen tree covered in small lights that… blinked.

Because the tree had eyes, large black eyes, and an adorable face.

"…What is that?" Tobirama asked, drifting over, and looking down in horror at what appeared to be a moving thinking tree. Because it wasn't just blinking now, it was smiling up at Hashirama, its evergreen branches shaking with enthusiasm at the sight of him.

"His name is Mr. Ukki, and he likes people." Lee explained, pushing the tree closer to Hashirama, not bothering to explain how the tree seemed to be alive and why it had a face and why she'd ever thought this monstrosity should ever see the light of day.

He glanced at his brother, he'd been silent for too long, which either meant he shared Tobirama's concerns or…

Hashirama flung his arms around the girl and squeezed the life out of her, twirling her around the yard, "It's adorable and I love it! How did you know I've always wanted a tiny tree-person?! I'm going to be the best tree-parent this little tree's ever had!"

Suddenly Lee was out of Hashirama's arms, standing next to Tobirama, and offering him a shiny blue box covered with far too many bows, "As a former hokage yourself, Senju Tobirama, you also were pretty much guaranteed a spot on the nice list. Although, your constant disapproval of Orochimaru's evil shenanigans plus your accompaniment with us to rescue your ungrateful grandniece pretty much clinched it."

With trepidation, still with a wary eye towards the overjoyed Hashirama and… Mr. Ukki, Tobirama carefully opened the box. For a moment he stared, very tempted to shut it, but somehow unable to and then with great care lifted out what appeared to be a miniaturized water dragon.

Which was somehow also inexplicably adorable.

"What is this?" He asked, for the second time that day, not liking how pleased the girl looked by all of this.

"It's a tiny suiton dragon! I call it Haku, but I guess you can call it whatever you like." Lee said, grinning at the sight of him, and the miniature dragon which was now winding its way around Tobirama's arm like a wristband.

"What am I supposed to do with it?" He asked, still eyeing it, noting how uncommonly stable it appeared to be despite the fact that it appeared to be made completely from water.

"I don't know, take it on retired hokage adventures with you… It's designed to actually become terrifying when you're in danger."

Why did that sound so very ominous? Especially when it looked so very… non-threatening. Could your heart melt a little just by staring into something's eyes? He didn't feel like it was a genjutsu but surely something this disturbing couldn't also be endearing.

"Oh, and Kushina, I got you buckets of ramen." Lee said, reaching into her bag and throwing literal buckets filled with ramen towards the red headed girl. Uzumaki ran out of the house, catching them with a whoop and shouting, "This is the best gift ever, believe it!"

"And remember everyone, the true spirit of Christmas can't be discovered merely by watching advertisements." Lee said sagely and then she was gone, as if she'd never been there in the first place, leaving Hashirama dancing like an idiot, Tobirama waiting for the tiny dragon to make its move, and Kushina digging into the first bucket of ramen.

* * *

"Merry Christmas, Lazy Nara! May every dream you have be filled with happiness!"

Shikaku was probably one of the few who remembered what December 25th meant, not only the winter, but Eru Lee appearing out of nowhere to disrupt his life. Thankfully he was actually in his house instead of on a mission like he'd been afraid might happen.

That would be the last thing he needed, to be in the middle of a C-rank, cornering bandits and to have Eru Lee appearing out of nowhere shouting, "Merry Christmas!"

He stared at her, standing inside of his bedroom with an overly cheerful grin, dressed in red, green, and white, holding that all too familiar oversized sack. If he could slam a door in her face and leave her on his doorstep he would, he would do so gladly, but unfortunately Lee could teleport.

There was just no avoiding it, none at all, he'd have to just live through it.

With that he graciously accepted the box he thrust into his hands, only sparing the sparkles and ribbons that she'd wrapped it in.

"Let me guess, it's another pillow." Opening the box he was completely unsurprised to find an oversized pillow. It was probably quite fluffy and comfortable but the pillow routine had gotten old after the third time he'd gotten one for Christmas.

Without care he tossed it onto his bed where it would join its fellow pillow brethren.

"Hey, Lazy Nara, I'm not the one who cemented my reputation for napping when we were six." Lee responded, which was fair enough but still, he was not that one dimensional.

"You know, I also like shogi." He pointed out but she didn't seem to care about that. Which meant the next year he'd probably be receiving another pillow.

At this point he expected Lee to shout some unintelligible moral about the spirit of Christmas then jump out the window like she did every other year, but instead, she lingered. She stared at him, assessing, and he stared back willing himself to appear bland and uninteresting.

It wasn't that he didn't like seeing Lee, but Lee without Minato usually meant something surreal and unpleasant would occur shortly afterwards, and he just didn't have the energy to deal with that.

"So, Lazy Nara, you're the most logical person I know." Lee started, stepping forward to look him in the eye, "If you were a demigod and or god of death, and your father lived in the reality between realities, and it was Christmas… Would you get him a gift?"

Well, that was quite the hypothetical situation he'd never considered.

Shikaku had long accepted that he would never really understand Eru Lee, and that he was okay with that. After all, he could usually count on Minato to translate most of it. So if she just non-chalantly proclaimed that she was the Shinigami itself… He was going to pretend it never happened.

She paused for a moment, considered him, and then descended into hand gestures to explain her hypothetical situation, "I mean, he never got me any gifts, right? I've had twelve birthdays so far and twelve Christmases, that's a lot of missed opportunities!"

She started pacing, Shikaku eyed his bed in longing, wondering if he could just nap his way through this.

"Seriously, it makes you wonder what he's been doing this whole time. And I mean, at first I wasn't upset about the whole Dursley thing because, well, they're not even real people so why get upset? Right? But then, I've been thinking about it, and he's the Shinigami, he could have left me anywhere. He could have had me raised by traveling mystical samurai monks but instead he leaves me in a defective suburban genjutsu! Is that good parenting? Is that deserving of a Christmas gift?" She paused, looking at Shikaku for confirmation, he said nothing, just stared back wondering when she'd run out of energy or get distracted and leave.

She wasn't getting distracted, and by the look on her face she was upset that he wasn't giving her an answer. She expected active participation in this conversation and to that he could only save himself by resorting to the back-up plan. Namely, distract her with a poor copy of her own brand of Lee-logic and hoped something clicked.

"Lee, I believe you told me last year, that sometimes you have to reflect deep inside of yourself to discover the true spirit of the holidays." It was the authority with which he said this, as if he understood every word he was saying, that made it a truly effective tactic.

She stopped glaring at least, considered his words carefully, then concluded, "That was, strangely, just as unsatisfying to hear as it usually is in television programs."

"You should think about it." Shikaku said, grabbing Lee by the arm and walking her to the door of his bedroom. Lee walked with him, in a daze, still thinking over his words.

"Well, now I don't know how I feel about all of this. Mildly confused?" Lee tried, her face twisting with indecision and confusion.

Shikaku always felt more or less confused around Lee, it was nice of her to finally join the bandwagon.

"Right, well, I hope you discover the true meaning of Christmas for yourself, Lee. In the meantime, merry Christmas." And with that he gave her a parting smile and slammed the door in her face with all of the satisfaction that Lee's bizarre winter holiday would allow.

And with that, he returned to his gifted pillows, and took a long nap.

* * *

Sakumo rested at home, feeling more worn than usual, taking his day off to relax on the couch watching as little Kakashi meticulously built a replica of Konoha with wooden blocks. The winter chill though, it was starting to get to him, in a way it never had when he was younger.

Even with peace he didn't have as much time as he needed to stay home with Kakashi. Too often he had to disappear in the middle of the night, thrusting Kakashi on whoever would take him, with a vague promise that he would probably return later.

(If the latest mission didn't kill him first.)

ANBU was a young man's game, for someone who didn't have a family, didn't have a son and a wife who'd died in childbirth. Even if you were one of the best, as Sakumo was, that sort of pressure wore you to the bone and he'd just get distracted out there thinking about Kakashi and the consequences if the mission went south.

And the look Kakashi would give him, whenever he returned, picking him up from Jiraiya or Maito Dai or whoever had been willing to take him in, every time it felt like someone was stabbing him in the heart.

Still, he'd give it a few more years, see that his subordinates were ready to take his place and that Danzo didn't gain too much control over the organization. Then, when things seemed stable enough without him, then he'd retire back into a normal field shinobi.

Until then he'd try to think on the nagging question of who would take Kakashi in should worst come to worst. Try to come up with ways so that his son didn't seem resigned to his absence, to Sakumo's duty to the village.

He was so quiet, so aware for a child his age, and it was breaking Sakumo's heart to see Kakashi just accepting this. Like this was the way the world worked and that Kakashi would have to adjust himself to it if he wanted to thrive. It wasn't so long ago that Kakashi had been a bright and cheerful toddler but now it was as if he'd turned all of that off. Like there was a tiny little switch inside his mind and with a careful flick everything went away.

With that thought Sakumo smiled, pulled himself off the couch, feeling all of the pops and cracks in his joints that hadn't been there five years earlier, and sat down next to Kakashi, picking up a block, "So, what are we building today, Kashi?"

Kakashi looked at him, his stare a little petulant and insulted that Sakumo was even asking, "Konoha."

Sakumo nodded, it usually was Konoha, and surveyed the walls and one stack of blocks in the middle, "Is this the hokage tower?"

Kakashi gave a small nod, to which Sakumo smiled encouragingly, "Well then, you might want to move it a little closer to the center, it's not this far to the left. Are you going to add the academy too?"

Before Kakashi could announce his plans regarding the academy, the block village of the leaf was decimated by the unexpected appearance of Eru Lee out of thin air, "Merry Christmas, Hatake Sakumo! I bring tidings of joy and materialism!"

He'd forgotten it was December 25th.

The past years he'd been working on the date, and so had instead faced Eru Lee in the middle of ANBU headquarters, receiving his presents as Wolf while on duty. Which, really, he always felt bad about because he had to pretend he never received anything and throw her into a holding cell for infiltrating headquarters. It was much better, he felt, for her to appear inside of the clan compound instead.

(Although, he supposed it should worry him that Lee had the ability to teleport inside of his own home, but he supposed it was about as worrying as the fact that she could teleport directly inside to ANBU headquarters as well.)

"Oh, right, Lee-chan, I suppose I should have been expecting you." Sakumo said and then spared a glance to his wide eyed son, whose eyes were brimming with tears for the fallen block Konoha, but was too stoic of a child to shed them in a stranger's presence, "Ah, Lee-chan, I'm afraid you've just destroyed Konoha…"

Lee looked down, surveyed the blocks, then cast a surprised glance to Kakashi. With a hasty step she stepped a little to the left and with a wave of her hand righted the blocks to former positions.

Kakashi stared at the resurrected village with wide and terrified eyes.

"Sorry about that… I'm sometimes a being of mindless destruction and chaos." Lee said, in complete and utter seriousness, before she stole another glance at Kakashi, "Is this your son? I didn't know you had a family."

"Ah yes, this is Kakashi," He smiled down at his son, pulled him into his lap, and watching as Kakashi shielded his face into Sakumo's clothing, "Kakashi, this is Eru Lee, she's a genin studying under Jiraiya. You remember Jiraiya, Kashi."

Lee sat down across from them, beaming at the pair of them, for a moment before her smile inexplicably fell. It was replaced by a desolate, empty, expression that was all too reminiscent of the bitter winds howling outside.

Then, before he could blink, the expression was gone and she was reaching through her bag for his annual present.

"As usual, Hatake Sakumo, you're like the cool uncle that I never really had, and as such you were firmly placed on the nice list." Lee explained as she dug out a silver box, one decorated with small moons and tiny dark wolves. Kakashi eyed the box in wonder, turning his head and reaching out a tiny hand to grab at the ribbon.

He smiled at it, taking it from her, "Thank you, Lee-chan."

"You want to help me open the box, Kashi?" Sakumo asked, and Kakashi hesitated only for a moment, eyes darting to Lee, and then he was tugging on the ribbon with precision and care, opening it to reveal a metal tube.

Sakumo picked it up, noting the grooves, almost as if it was a handle to a blade, and found what appeared to be a button on the side. Holding it away from himself and Kakashi he pressed the button lightly and then immediately fell back at the sight of a beam of blinding blue emitting from the tube.

He quickly switched it off, clutching Kakashi to his chest, and wondering why he thought it would be a good idea to play with Eru Lee's toys with his two-year-old son in the room.

"It's a lightsaber!" Eru Lee explained with a grin, taking the blade from his non-responsive hand, and then turning it on and twirling it this way and that, every movement accompanied by a humming swoosh noise, "I know you already have a pretty awesome sword but there is no blade more honorable and awesome than a jedi's light saber."

"Ah, yes… Is this the nidaime's lost sword?" He was fairly certain that had been a different color but leave it to Lee to deliver Senju Tobirama's sword to his doorstep without warning. Although, he probably would have to give it back to the resurrected nidaime if that was the case.

"Wait, the nidaime has a lightsaber? Does this mean he's a space ninja? Why does no one tell me these amazing things?" Lee said, and judging by her expression her entire world view had just rearranged itself, "Wait, but, no this is a different lightsaber. I made this one."

Carefully pointing the blade away from Kakashi he turned it on, feeling the chakra pulse through the blade. The light, it wasn't light at all, it was chakra, so thick and dense that it was visible, "You made this?"

"Yup, I believe in handmade presents… I also make ridiculously little as a genin so homemade things are all I can afford." Lee confessed, looking entirely nonchalant about it, as if she had no idea the sort of craftsmanship that went into making blades such as these.

Again her eyes strayed to Kakashi, who was looking at the sword in both terror and wonder, "I would have brought something for your kid but I had no idea he existed."

He quickly turned it off, stowed it back into the box, and redirected his attention to her, "Oh, Lee-chan, you don't have to do that…"

But then she was grinning and with a wave of her hands she produced a plush yellow duck out of thin air, "I hope he likes ducks!"

Kakashi made no move towards the duck and eyed it with suspicion. Sakumo intervened with a somewhat strained smile, "Ah, he likes dogs actually."

The plush duck transformed itself into an equally adorable plush dog which then floated its way over to Kakashi and then placed itself in front of him. Ever cautious, Kakshi poked at it first, waiting for it to attack.

"I'm so good at this present thing." Lee said as she watched him, beaming once again, but as she looked the expression seemed to drip from her and once more there was nothing in her eyes but that desolate emptiness that had only been a flicker before.

"Lee? Are you alright?"

"Hm, what, I'm fine…" She trailed off, looking at Kakashi, and then said, "You seem like a good dad."

Sakumo glanced down at Kakashi, watching as he continued to bait the plush dog, waiting for it to make its move, and felt at once old and terribly tired, "I like to think so. It's rare that I get to spend time home with Kashi, I like to make the most of it."

"…Well, I only see my father when I'm dead so it's a marked improvement from my parenting situation." Lee offered with a shrug, eyes landing on Kakashi, who by this time had looked up to stare back at her.

For a moment he couldn't quite register what she had said until he remembered she was an orphan, and she must have meant she wouldn't be reunited with her parents until she herself died, "I'm sure your parents would have loved you very much, Lee-chan."

"Well, I think he loves me, but he's really big on the tough love thing and solving my own problems." Lee said before adding, "He's always telling me to figure things out for myself and that I'll probably suffer a lot along the way but otherwise I'll never really believe him about anything. I mean, I think that's love… But it's a very strange, shinobi-esq, way of showing it. Nothing like my holiday television specials."

And at once Sakumo felt like his grasp of the conversation had flown out the window, "I'm sorry, I'm confused, I thought you were an orphan."

"Well… Technically? If your father is the Shinigami, death itself, does that make you an orphan? I mean, by those standards I am the orphaniest orphan who has ever lived."

Sakumo blinked, and then he blinked again, and he wondered if Lee was saying something that he just wasn't comprehending, "Your father is the Shinigami?"

"Oh, right, I guess you never got the full explanation." Lee said, "Remember that one time when I rose from the dead after eating all of Orochimaru's lethal poisons?"

"Vaguely." He responded, which was a bit of an understatement, because he very clearly remembered that particular episode.

"Well, it turns out I can't actually die, or I can choose not to die, it's very unclear, and that my father's the Shinigami and not James Potter like my relatives always said. Only, he doesn't want to admit he's my father, but he is because we look ridiculously alike and it explains everything about everything and well… I don't know. I don't know how I feel about all of this."

Sakumo could focus on the fact that Eru Lee had confessed to being a demigod (which, strangely, made some amount of sense) or he could look underneath the words that he just couldn't process right now and focus on the real source of the conversation.

"Do you… do you want to talk about your father?" Sakumo finally managed to ask, at the question Lee startled, grew still for a moment and finally nodded her head.

"Normally it doesn't bother me, I mean, it never did when I thought he was some dead guy named James Potter. I never needed blood relatives, never really wanted them either. I had Minato and together we were better than anything I could ever hope for. But, now that I know he's out there… I guess I don't know what I should expect from him, how I should feel about him." She sighed, falling onto her back and staring up at the ceiling with wide green eyes, as if Sakumo's roof might hold the answers to fatherhood's infinite mysteries, "Should I be angry that he never came to visit, didn't even let me know he was… a thing until I was stabbed to death by a plant zombie? Should I be happy that there's someone out there who… understands? I just don't know what to feel."

In his arms Kakashi was perfectly still, focused on the conversation, how much he understood was debatable but Sakumo had no doubt that Kakashi knew that somehow he was a vital part of this conversation, that it was in its own way centering on him, rather than on Lee.

Sakumo smiled down at him, ruffled his hair, and then turned his attention to Lee.

Lee, who could have benefited so much from any parent in her life.

Sakumo sighed, reached out with a hand and threaded his fingers through her bangs, brushing them aside to reveal a small scar in the shape of a lightning bolt, "I can't explain how you feel, Lee, only you can decide that. I might, however, be able to explain why your father acts the way he does. As a shinobi my aim is to protect the village as well as my son, to see that he doesn't have to lead the life I lived, and that he can choose for himself what he wants to be. However, because of that duty, I can't always be there for Kakashi when he needs me."

He glanced down at Kakashi, who was staring back him with wide grey eyes, and Sakumo wished this was a conversation that Kakshi could fully understand at this age. That he could understand that Sakumo did not love him any less when he left in the middle of the night for missions, when he disappeared for weeks on end, and that it was tearing him apart to do what needed to be done. But Kakashi was too young for that, so he would only listen with wide eyes, and he would forget and hopefully… Hopefully, he would understand later.

"I wouldn't know what being a death god entails but I imagine your father's in a similar situation to mine. His absence doesn't mean he loves you less, the advice he gives doesn't mean he's keeping his distance, just that for whatever reason he has to keep things the way they are."

She sat up, green eyes wide and hopeful as she stared at him, willing herself to understand, "You think so?"

"If he's anything like me, then I know it." He said smiling back, watching as she stood, smiling softly down at him and Kakashi.

"You really are the cool uncle I never had, Hatake Sakumo." With one final grin she waved her hand in the air, producing small snowflakes, and blew them over Kakashi and Sakumo, "Merry Christmas, everybody, and a happy new year!"

And then, just like that, she was gone. Slowly, carefully, Kakashi reached out to the plush dog and hugged it to him, jolting at the squeaking noise it made at being squeezed. Sakumo laughed, looked down at his son, and asked, "Well, Kashi, why don't we give your new friend a name and introduce him to your Konoha?"

And just like that they continued to build the block village together, their new stuffed animal friend standing witness as the walls of Konoha grew ever higher.

* * *

Underneath the branches of the great golden tree Eru Lee delivered her final gift, "Merry Christmas, Death."

* * *

 **Author's Note: I almost had a scene of Jiraiya giving into temptation and watching 'Hamlet' the porn edition, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it after that Sakumo moment. So you can all just picture that instead. Written for the 700th review of "Minato Namikaze and the Destroyer of Worlds" by Tamani who asked for a fic where Shikaku and Sakumo find out about Lee being the Master of Death... That turned into a Christmas Special.**

 **Thanks to readers, reviews are much appreciated, I won't be responding though until manages to fix its review thing but I will read them.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Harry Potter**


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